U.S.A. Hockey Goalie Ryan Miller: After the Olympics

The tough thing about winning a silver medal in the Olympic ice-hockey tournament is that, unlike the gold- and bronze-medal teams, the second-place team earns its spot on the podium by losing a game.

“I don’t know how I’m going to deal with the loss,” Team U.S.A. hockey goalie Ryan Miller told me when I met up with him yesterday in New York City. “I’m still sort of right in the middle of it. I’m going to keep working towards my next goal, which is helping the Buffalo Sabres make the play-offs.”

“And this time, silver isn’t bad,” he added, referring to the N.H.L.’s ultimate prize: the Stanley Cup.When it comes to playing goalie, Miller’s philosophy is that it’s his job to give his team the best possible chance to win. He’d come unglued if he started worrying about whether he was responsible for a win or loss. “Winning is definitely a team effort,” he said when I spoke to him before the Olympics. “A goalie can steal a game—a lot of people talk about that. Some nights the other team’s goalie might be playing well, but as long as I give my team a chance, I can feel good about my performance.”

Throughout the 2010 Winter Games, Miller gave Team U.S.A. a chance to win and then some; in fact, his impressive goal-saving statistics earned him M.V.P. of the Vancouver tournament. But still, that overtime goal scored by Canada’s Sidney Crosby in the gold-medal game has got to haunt the U.S. net-minder.

“It does sting to put yourself a shot away and get beaten,” Miller said yesterday. “Especially as a goaltender, to think what could you have done to change the outcome. I feel like I did everything the right way. I tried to play the whole tournament aggressive. I tried to play that last play aggressive. And for me, I gave my team a chance to win”—there’s that phrase again—“and that’s the most I can do.”

Going into the Olympics, Miller’s goal for himself was to have as much fun as possible. “Honestly,” he said. I believe him. After all, having a good time seems to be a theme throughout Miller’s hockey career.

“For me, it was always about having fun,” he said. “Even though my whole family played at a high level, it was always: ‘Are you having fun going to the rink?’ When things were tough or if I had a bad loss, my parents would talk to me, and they’d be like, ‘Oh, yeah, it was a tough game—are you still having fun?’ It comes down to that.”

And Team U.S.A. was in a good position to have fun in Vancouver.

“No one really picked us to finish that high,” Miller said. “We were in that underdog role. The expectation for us was to have a good tournament, and anything else was a bonus. So we really just jumped onto the fact that we were counted out.”

Looking back, Miller says it was surprisingly easy for the U.S. players to gel as a team, even though they had only one day to practice as a group before being thrown into their first game on hockey’s biggest stage. “We knew it was going to be one of the challenges, but U.S.A. Hockey did a good job of getting us together in the summer and making an environment where we could get to know each other. We did the practice and media stuff during the day, and would get dinner and would have time to bond. The staff involved some gentlemen from the military who had been wounded and brought them in to talk. Having them relay their experience representing our country worldwide, and then being in a dinner environment where everyone could talk, made it really easy to slip into Vancouver and get caught up.

“We had a good group of guys. Everyone from the management to the coaches on down to the rest of the staff, everyone was really positive and had really fun personalities—and had a good sense of humor. Jamie Langenbrunner and Chris Drury, being our more veteran leadership, were really easy to get along with and very positive. That filtered down to the younger guys who had a lot of energy, and who had something to prove—it was an opportunity for a lot of us to prove something.”

Team U.S.A. beat Switzerland 3-1 in the first game of the preliminary round of the tournament and then blew past Norway 6-1. And then it did the unthinkable: it took down Goliath, Team Canada, 5-2. It was such a big deal in Canada that the next day, the Vancouver Sun’s headline read: “Woe, Canada, U.S. Sticks Stake in Our Hearts.”

“I think that game was a turning point for both teams,” Miller says. “I think it woke Canada up. For us, it gave us the confidence to get through to the gold-medal game.”

And how did Miller feel about crushing the hopes and dreams of an entire country?

“It was a lot of fun playing that game and getting a big win like that,” he says. “Up until that point, it was one of the biggest games I had ever played in, and that win felt amazing. To have a rematch that went into overtime was a lot of fun, too.”

It was around that time that Miller started getting recognized on the Vancouver streets, which were a mob scene. “Here and there, there would be a few shouts, ‘Hey, that’s the American goalie!’ But it wasn’t followed by, ‘We’re going to beat you up.’ It was followed by, ‘Go Canada!’”

But Miller wasn’t just recognized in hockey country. He became a household name in the U.S., too.

“It became pretty apparent that we had America’s attention when I went on Ryan Seacrest—that was different,” Miller said. “That’s a completely different world to us. We are used to talking to our local sports page and local sports radio. If we get anything national, it’s usually sometime deep in the play-offs. But to suddenly be thrust into the spotlight
It’s been good for the game in that way. We don’t get many of these moments where we are at the forefront. It’s usually football, basketball, or baseball, and if we don’t take advantage, people won’t find out about what we feel is the greatest game.”

Then the improbable happened again: Team U.S.A. and Team Canada both made it to the gold-medal matchup, an event hailed as the best thing that could ever happen to North American hockey. We all know how that story goes: Canada had the lead the entire game until U.S.A.’s Zach Parise tied it up with only seconds left on the clock. In overtime, Canada’s golden child, Sidney Crosby, who had a mediocre tournament up until that point, scored on America’s brick wall. It couldn’t have been scripted any better. Sid the Kid became a Canadian national hero once again, and the Canadians kept the gold where they felt it belonged.

“That first game against Canada, we jumped out and got an early lead, so the crowd was kind of worried early on,” Miller says. “But that last game, Canada got a lead early and the crowd was having a good time until we were able to tie it—and then everyone got a little bit tense. One more shot and we would have silenced an entire nation.

“Crosby’s a great player. We’ve had a lot of moments. He’s gotten the better of me in the bigger venues so far. I’ll have my chance to get back at him.”

And when he does, it will probably be fun.

“If playing hockey wasn’t fun, it would be very hard to do what we do in the N.H.L., because it’s every day,” Miller says. “But that’s why we do it. We enjoy it. When you are in a big moment and it doesn’t go right, it feels really tough, but when you step back, you really just played a game, and had fun doing it.”